At the beginning, each candidate will be entitled to an opening statement during which vile epithets will be limited to five per candidate. Any additional epithets you try to wedge in will be pre-empted by commercials for new, very expensive drugs that no one can pronounce for diseases that no one knew existed.

Also, a gong will sound and you will be dragged off the stage by a large hook.

After the opening statements, the first segment of the debate will focus on outright lies. Points will be allotted, in ascending order, for misrepresentations, fabrications, fibs, falsehoods and damn good whoppers.

At this point, the moderator will ask each of the candidates a particularly innocuous question that you will not answer in any way but will cleverly deflect so you can transition right into your standard stump speech. For instance, if the question is about what you would do to end the war in Syria, you will be judged on your ability to work in how great it is to be back here in [insert town].

Extra points will be awarded for the first candidate who thanks the moderator, along with the American people, and who can sing the Star Spangled Banner.

Each answer to the questions will be limited to three minutes. If you go over that time, you will not be allowed to use vowels during your next response.

Your opponent will then have two minutes to respond to your response, before you have one minute to respond to the response of your response, while your opponent will then have 30 seconds to scream at the top of his or her lungs.

The next part of the debate will focus on slurs, smears and slanders. Each candidate will have two minutes or so to match the most spurious claim about dishonesty with the actual real fib by the other candidate. At that point, the other candidate will have the opportunity to hit the first candidate with a shoe.

We will then turn our attention to domestic affairs. Each of you will have 90 seconds to name as many state capitals as you can. Please note that Louisville is not the capital of Kentucky even if you would like it to be.

Our last segment will concentrate on foreign affairs, during which time each of you will be asked to spell Kyrgyzstan. Extra points will be given for the first candidate who knows where Kyrgyzstan is. Two points will be deducted for confusing Kyrgyzstan with Tajikistan.

Finally, each candidate will be allotted four minutes for a closing statement. Whoever buzzes in first gets the last word. Please remember, of course, that the closing statement has to be in the form of a question.